The country was rocked by recession this year and the state was crippled by an ongoing cash crunch, but lawmakers still managed to keep the money flowing to their campaign coffers.
The Fair Political Practices Commission released a tally today showing that incumbent lawmakers held more than 325 money-raising mixers in Sacramento this year. And we're not talking chump change -- giving the maximum requested contribution at every event would have set you back $1.26 million.
In typical Capitol fashion, the end-of-session stretch was stacked with pricey pushes to boost those campaign war chests. More than 25 percent of the 2009 fundraisers were crammed into the final three weeks of the session. The combined cash requested for events on the two busiest days of the year -- Aug. 25 and 26 -- totaled nearly $130,000 per contributor. (Check out a map of the Aug. 26 events here).
FPPC also found that incumbents are looking well beyond 2010 and getting a head start fundraising for future bids. More than 20 percent of the events in Sacramento this year were raising dough for causes and campaigns other than 2010 runs, according to the release.
Read the FPPC's release here.
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